Coast to Coast Pt.3 19/9/2000

Borrowdale to Grasmere, 8 miles.
It's easy to forget how mobile phone coverage has improved in the last 10 years. In 2000 I had my first mobile, not that I used it much. Along the whole crossing I only managed to get a good signal near to the M6 and A1, in Borrowdale you could forget it. The mountain tops were very occasionaly acceptable. I had two phones in fact and was taking part in a mobile banking trial for NatWest. The early Nokia WAP phone could transact business and I managed to pay a bill with it near Calf Crag on this day. The trial was successful but take up was slight so the service was dropped soon after and only to reappear as a smartphone application in 2009.

Many C2C'ers hop across to Patterdale on their third day but we were heading to Grasmere. Years later I met two walkers from the USA who were crossing to Shap from Borrowdale in a single day, two long C2C days in one - that didn't sound like fun.

It was a nice morning and would remain so for the rest of the day. We caught up with the large group from the day before as we wound our way up to Greenup Edge. Pete was ahead of me and caught up with them first but not before a fit member of the party bounded back down the path.

It turned out that one member had left his sunglasses on a rock some distance back and the runner had offered to pop back and get them for him. He ran about 1/4-mile steep down and ran back up, SAS trainees after all perhaps. They were heading for Patterdale so we wouldn't see them again.



The climb up to the edge always seems quite a puff and the transition across to Grasmere is another of the, now notorious areas where it's easy to loose the way. We had clear skies and good views so weren't troubled. I took a shot looking back as we crossed and managed to capture Pete falling over, again.

We walked the Calf Crag ridge but dropped down before Helm Crag. I'd been up there many times before, it looked crowded on top and I hate crowds on the hills.

A female friend walked the C2C in the early 1990s. She's a midwife from Australia, and was accompanied by three other Australian midwives. They became lost in mist on the crossing from Borrowdale over to Grasmere and ended up staying the night on Calf Crag. It's not her happiest fellwalking memory.

Grasmere appeared all too soon and we went to find our B&B, Fairy Glen, we were the only guests.